Funny how jetpacks have become the symbol we all use to express disappointment that the future isn’t so, well, futuristic. Why not hover cars? Robot butlers? Here we are only six years from when Blade Runner is set and I’ve yet to hear one complaint about the lack of Replicants.

If I had a wish for 2013 — besides a robot butler, that is — it would be for a permanent job, though I have been enjoying the gun-for-hire life I know it won’t always bring home the bacon needed to buy the baby a new bonnet and it would be nice to be settled.

The most memorable recent New Year’s Eve I had was in 1999 which I spent in New York City and asked my wife to marry me the moment the clock struck 12:00 to usher in the new millennium. Probably my favourite ever in London was in 1992 the last time myself and all my college friends were together in the same place and found ourselves in the tiny, members-only Troy Club (sadly now closed) standing on the tables drunkenly singing along to Frank Sinatra songs playing on the jukebox until the early hours of the next morning. But not all New Year’s Eve rose to the level of stories to tell the grandchildren, when I was a young nightclubber in London that night was both the most anticipated and most stressful of the year. The pressure to be having the greatest time of your life (champagne bottle in one hand, kissable girl in the other) when the clock struck 12:00 was enormous and usually disappointed. After several years I got fed up with the hassle of paying an arm and a leg to get into a packed, six-deep-at-the-bar club (and one time being kept waiting in the queue outside until 11:55) and the older you get the desire to chase that moment becomes less and less important anyway, by then you’ve had plenty of other “moments” to cherish in nightclubs on other nights.

So now I’m an old fart I’ll be spending it on the couch getting cozy with the missus, chances are we won’t manage to stay awake until midnight either. But I’m not dead yet and to prove it here are some actual new (new!) records I enjoyed in 2008. For some reason 3/4 of them seem to be by rather fetching young ladies.